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So you have a character perform an action. Say they set a trap or whatever. The GM can use fiat to make it go whichever way the GM chooses, the trap works or it doesn't. The way you framed it. The player has a hoped for outcome. The player wants the trap to work and the GM is using fiat to...

See my previous post but you also hit the nail on the head. Why do you have a hoped for outcome? and why should I care? EDIT: This comes off as too aggressive. My previous post was more moderated.

The issue I have with this framing is that I don't know how (or whether it's desirable) you manoeuvre toward an end state and so I don't know how applicable the general language of games is to rpg's. In chess I want to get the opponent in check mate and so I use the moves I have available to me...

Good points. The owners of the respective characters retain full control over their characters thoughts and actions. So the player can't say 'I make her fall in love with me' because that's for the GM to decide and vice versa. (it's the same split you see in most trad games) If two responses...

I want to return to a play example I used previously if anyone is interested. So the situation is that there's this hitman, he's meticulous, methodical and the enforcer for what's basically corporate organized crime. He lives a solitary, disciplined life. He meets this party girl and she's a...

The framing of a lot of this conversation assumes (often unintentionally) that of the GM mystery cult. The GM needs guardrails and introspection and a good system because they are the primary social and aesthetic facilitator. Given that this is one of my big criticisms of rpg culture in general...

You and manbear have really opened up the problem a bit more. Who cares what the process is when it's transparent to everyone at the table. If it's not transparent to everyone at the table then we're dealing with a very different aesthetic dynamic. I'm surprised I didn't see that earlier but...

Where I agree with you. In really broad terms it's incumbent on the GM to be open about their process because there are lots of ways to GM and lots of cultural assumptions about the GM role. Especially the GM as mysterious entertainer who stewards the game and provides a good time for the...

It depends on whether you think rules should create accountability. I don't but I'm also sympathetic to the idea that principles should be enumerated. The issue with accountability is it creates a play culture where you can point to the rules and say 'I'm following the rules' and it leads to...

Most fiat is principled, you just need to find out what the principle is. Four somewhat common principles: Ask what would be there, if indeterminate then decide yes and think about what clues it could offer. Ask what would be there, if indeterminate then nothing that actively harms or helps...

If I'm playing some 'generic' Narrativist game (say The Pool). If I want some deep mysterious backstory then I just write deep mysterious backstory. To give a concrete example: The character is: A hard boiled detective, going to a seaside town to investigate the disappearance of a teenage girl...

Ah my bad. I assumed you, the GM, knew the answer to the mystery. Like you had a specific person in mind before the investigation happened.

I don't like thinking about this stuff but my mind does its own thing and so I ended up jotting down the skeleton of two games to work through it. Some brief thoughts at the bottom. THE 'REAL' KEY The occult apocalypse machine is ticking down. In one hour the world will be devoured. You need...

I didn't give my actual take on BitD. So going with 'no myth' as a play style (flags, minimal backstory, GM facilitates, fail forward). Then my answer as to when to use it is: Does off-screen positioning matter for strategic purposes, is this challenge based play? Myth Does the clash of...

We're running into the issue of just having to show completed Apocalypse World prep. I was looking to see whether my prep was suitable but it's lots of scribbles that only make sense if you're me. A majority of the prep centres around the values and the resources of groups of people and how they...

Well there's some stuff that I wonder about but it's going to mostly build out a character, not lead to much consequential revelation. There's no real exploration going on in my games (any of them). I think almost all the good stuff happens after backstory reveals, so I try to get it out the...

By revelation I mean the introduction of backstory. So the maelstrom is an area where I would flesh that out but I do mention that in my post. What will we make of the world and so on is just the result of conflicts. So no backstory involved, just changing positions. E.G. Midnight massacres the...

In AW specifically there just isn't much room for revelation. The characters are mostly going to places they already know, or kind of know, or know of. Same with mystery, there just isn't much room for it given the nature of the fictional circumstances. There is some hidden backstory and...

Revelation that bad stuff has happened isn't a hard move. Although in general your prep shouldn't be 'this bad thing has happened' because by the end of session one you should have a situation in motion so there's no need to prep much else. or to the extent there is, you never need to prep...

Nah we're actually only disagreeing in a minor way. You're allowed to make as hard a move as you like at any time (in AW specifically) but in general you should start soft. In session one though, I'm far more likely to make very hard moves. Although I probably wouldn't do the above for a whole...